Hold Me Now Stay With Me

I'm due for a promotion when I stumble upon my husband entangled with his childhood sweetheart. After that, I'm secretly admitted to a psychiatric facility. I repeatedly tell the doctors that I'm fine, but all I get is worse abuse and humiliation. When Howard Armstrong visits me every month, I beg him to get me out. Each time, he says, "This is a proper establishment, so you have to follow the doctor's instructions. Don't be unreasonable!" On the day I'm discharged, he speaks to me tenderly and calls me his honey. Later, when I place a divorce agreement before him, he breaks down in tears.

Everyone called Mia a shameless whore. However, the one trailing behind her was the youngest don of the Yorick family, James. He hand-washed her lace camisoles, broke three ribs for her, and even with his face covered in blood from a beating, he could still smile at her. One night, after too much drinking, the underboss he trusted most leaned down beside him. His face was full of disdain. “Boss, Mia is a disgrace to all of us! A woman like that, how could she ever be worthy of you?” James suddenly laughed. His eyes went terrifyingly blank. The cigar between his fingers glowed faintly in the dark. “Back then, before I secured my position, I was young, greedy for power. To get my sister-in-law that antique necklace she wanted, I took advantage of Mia being drunk and took pictures of her myself… “Ten dollars a copy. I sold thirty thousand of them. Things blew way out of control… I owe her.” James took a long drink of whiskey while his Adam’s apple bobbed. “Thankfully… she will never know. I will spend my whole life making it up to her, treating her twice as well.” He did not see the private room door quietly close the moment he said those words. Mia turned around with a blank expression on her face and walked into a small clinic on the corner. She laid down on the operating table. He would never deserve to know that he had once been a father, if only for a moment. That whole lifetime he planned to spend making it up to her, she did not want it anymore.

I took a shortcut through the alley and watched Dante Marchetti put a bullet in a man like it was nothing. He saw my face. That was the end of my normal life. Within an hour I was in the back of his car being driven to an estate I had never seen before with gates that locked from the outside and a wardrobe full of clothes in my exact size waiting like someone had known I was coming before I did. He told me I wasn't a prisoner but a guest. He said people who wanted to find me were considerably worse than him and that his walls were the only thing standing between me and a conversation I wouldn't survive. Maybe he was right. The problem is the longer I stayed the harder it became to remember which one was true. Because the man who caught me in that alley wasn't the only version of him. There was another one that nobody else seemed to get to see. The one who stood alone in his dead mother's library looking tired in a way that had nothing to do with sleep. The one who had my cat brought to the estate because he heard me crying through a closed door and didn't know what else to do about it. The one who almost smiled when I threw a glass at his head. That version of him was the one I couldn't stop thinking about. I came here as a witness. I stayed as something else entirely. Somewhere between the locked doors, the candlelit dinners and the secrets we started sharing in the dark I stopped wanting to leave. The question was whether a woman like me could survive loving a man like him. I was about to find out.

The church was full of different kinds of majestic decorations. A theme of white and gold, the color that is perfectly expressing both purity and prosperity. Indeed, it is really f*cking wonderful. But then... On this fre*king wonderful day who would have thought that a mere guest like me who was forced to attend this d*mn wedding of my damn stepsister will become the bride??! “She is right here. The… bride is here. We shall start the ceremony, Mr. Morgan” “Is it her?” “Y-yes. She is the one you will marry.” “Wait what, me?!”

In Meridian City, life moves fast and ambition drives the elite. At the top of the corporate food chain is Adrian Langston, a charismatic yet ruthless CEO of a multinational tech company. His success and wealth are unrivaled, and he is accustomed to getting what he wants—until he meets Isabella "Bella" Martinez, a fiercely independent freelance graphic designer. Bella is focused on her career and family, with a vibrant personality that is both charming and down-to-earth. She navigates the hectic city life with a sense of humor and a strong moral compass. Despite her attraction to Adrian's charisma, she's determined not to be swept into his world of power plays and high-stakes business. Adrian, on the other hand, is intrigued by Bella's resistance to his usual charm. He's used to closing deals and winning over people with ease, but Bella proves to be a challenge. What starts as a simple business proposition soon turns into a complex game of cat-and-mouse, with Adrian trying to earn Bella's trust and Bella questioning whether she can believe his intentions.

• • • FOR ADULT READERS ONLY • • •️️️ I shouldn’t have wanted him. Not when he was older. Not when he was untouchable. Not when he was my father’s best friend. Not when he belonged to a world I was never meant to step into. But I did. I was five years old when I decided he was mine. Standing at his wife’s graveside in the rain, I held his face with my little hands and told him I would grow up and be his. He said: Is that right. Not a question. So I kept my word. Adrian Keller. My father's best friend. The man who watched me grow. The man who built an empire on control. The man no one touches. The man I wasn’t supposed to want. For thirteen years, I loved him the only way I was allowed to. In silence. At a distance. Across rooms that belonged to our families — not to what I was carrying. Until the night I turned eighteen. I said it out loud. He shut it down in one word: “Don’t.” So I did. I stopped looking at him. I stopped wanting him. I stopped being the girl who built her entire world around a man who would never choose her. I walked away. That should have been the end. It wasn’t. Because the moment I stopped reaching for him, was the moment Adrian Keller started looking for me. Across rooms. Across tables. At midnight — staring at a name he shouldn’t want. The man who taught me control is starting to lose his. And this time… He’s not asking. And underneath the empire, Underneath the discipline, Underneath fifteen years of unshakable control— Something ruinous is coming loose.

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“Is it really impossible for you to love me? Even a little?” I sounded desperate. His lips curled into a mocking grin. “Love you? Don’t be ridiculous. I would never love a desperate woman like you. Amanda’s my everything. And you? You are nothing.” *** Angel Elowyn Montero and Gideon Elwood were once good friends until marriage ruined everything they had. To Gideon, she was the reason his life was ruined and the reason the woman he loved never returned. Their marriage was loveless and detached. Despite everything, she held on to the hope that he would eventually love her too. His family, except for his parents, despised Angel as well. In the mansion, she was treated worse than a servant by his siblings, who bossed her around and even hurt her physically. Until one day, she finally had enough. She grew tired of hoping for a love that would never be reciprocated. So, when her husband handed her divorce papers again, she did not think twice and signed them. Only after she was gone did Gideon realize his own feelings. He loved her far more than he had ever allowed himself to admit. But by then, it was too late. He no longer knew where his ex-wife was. Years later, she returned. Angel was no longer the fragile woman who endured everything for the sake of love. She came back as someone entirely different: fierce, bold, independent. Now, the tables had finally turned. He loved her, and he was determined to win her back.

Anna Whitmore dated Lucas Caldwell, a young heir from New York’s old-money circle, for three years. When the time was right, she decided to reveal who she truly was and formally proposed a strategic marriage. On the day she planned to propose, he made an excuse and walked away. That same night, he was seen at a nightclub, arms wrapped around another woman, openly mocking the idea of marrying someone “without status or value.” Anna saw his true face and walked away for good. If marriage in their world had always been a transaction, then choosing a man with greater power and influence was only fair. So she married his uncle. Later, on the day Lucas Caldwell announced his engagement to the daughter her father chose to acknowledge, he saw her at the banquet. The so-called “unfavored” Whitmore heiress. His former girlfriend. She stood beside his uncle under the spotlight, smiling— calm, radiant, untouchable. The man next to her was the one who truly controlled New York’s upper circle, a level of power Lucas Caldwell would never reach. His uncle spoke lightly, and the entire room fell silent. “She is my wife.”

He destroyed her life in a heartbeat. Now he wants her heart to beat for him. On her wedding day, Elena Robertson wore red for love. It ended in blood. Her parents, slaughtered before her eyes. Her fiancé, gunned down with a smile on his lips. Her freedom, stolen by the man who thought she was someone else. Thorne Del Roi. The Mafia King feared across continents. Cold. Merciless. Godless. He took everything from her to avenge a crime she never committed. He broke her, used her, poisoned her soul with vengeance. But truth cuts deeper than any blade. Now, the devil who destroyed her is the only one who can’t stop craving her. Not for her body, but for the heart he never meant to feel beating in his chest. And Elena? She wants to hate him. She should hate him. But what do you do when your enemy becomes the air you breathe? He’s power. She’s fury. He’s fire. She’s the match. And when love ignites between them, it won’t just burn, it will explode. So much twist you can't imagine. Dive and enjoy the ride.